


finding her feet again

by fizzyblogic (phizzle)



Category: Dark Angel
Genre: F/F, Recreational Drug Use, Spiritual Drug Use, WIP Amnesty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-23
Updated: 2011-02-23
Packaged: 2017-11-14 16:22:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/517259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phizzle/pseuds/fizzyblogic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This was going to be a totally badass Original Cindy fic where she moved on with her life and was strong and awesome and met Max and they got together. Alas, I could never quite make it work, wrote two different drafts, and abandoned it in frustration. But I like both drafts a lot, so here they are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	finding her feet again

_version 1_

Diamond gets caught again and Original Cindy gives up on her.

Cynthia would have hidden in the squat, bartered everything she owned for food, just as long as she wouldn’t have to see anyone. Original Cindy moves further into the city, walks into a courier office and says, “Original Cindy is looking for a job. You’re going to give it to me, a’ight?” Her heart thumps.

A bewildered white man in a button-down shirt with a headset and glasses stares at her from across the hatch. “I thought you said this … Cindy person is looking for a job?”

“That’s right. Original Cindy, your newest employee, standing before you.” She flourishes a gesture and steps back half a pace. He looks her over, blinking rapidly.

“Third person aside, I suppose I can find use for one more of you bums. Fill in an application.” He hands her a form.

“You got a pen?” she asks, holding a hand out.

“I can provide the lady with what she needs.” The voice comes from behind her, so Original Cindy turns. The smell of stale joints almost bowls her over for a second, but then there’s just his smile. He hands her a slightly battered ballpoint. “Herbal Thought, at your service my sister.”

Brother’s got a friendly face. “Original Cindy is pleased to meet you,” she gives the full pearly whites back.

“Sector five,” the white guy says, handing Herbal a package. Original Cindy starts filling in the form, faintly aware of people coming and going behind her. The white guy behind the desk leaves, and she can hear him berating someone for being late. Filling in the final space on the form, she wonders what the fuck _bip bip bip_ is supposed to mean.

Turning, she spots the guy he was hollering at; tall, lanky, white male, bowing his head slightly and talking rapidly. Something about being held up at a checkpoint. Original Cindy takes in the rest of the room, bustle of people, bikes and lockers and benches.

Boss man comes back to the desk, takes her form. Original Cindy keeps the pen. “I’ll get you a sector pass in the morning.” From behind him somewhere, he picks up a small stack of packages. “These are all for this sector. Now bip.”

She takes them, wondering where she’s going to get a bike and if everything will fit in her backpack.

“You’re new, right?” someone says to her left. She looks. Man has a sweet smile and an extra bike.

“This place is crawling with helpful males,” she smiles at him. “Original Cindy just got the job.”

“I’m Theo. Here,” he leans the bike nearest to her closer, and she takes it. “I can introduce you to someone who sells messenger bags, you’ll need one.”

“Thanks.” She has a backpack, for this eventuality, and tries to cram all of the packages in. Theo takes the last two and puts them in his own bag.

“Come on. I’ll show you the ropes. Do you know this sector well?” He turns his bike, and they walk up the ramp.

“Not really.” She follows when he starts off east, and they ride together to the first drop-off. Theo talks all the way, pointing out streets and alleys and the left turning for the market, the best coffee shops and sandwich vendors for cheap lunch, the way to a bar called Crash where everyone hangs out after work.

The drop-off is simple. In the space between ringing the bell and the door opening, Theo says, “Always get a signature, and we’re supposed to say _Thank you for using Jam Pony_.”

“Got it.” Original Cindy makes a face, but is all smiles by the time the client comes to the door. “Jam Pony messenger, you have a package.” She hands it over, gets a signature, smiles pretty and says, “Thank you for using Jam Pony.” The door closes in her face, barely a grunt from the client. “He was nice,” she says to Theo, bitchface on. “Real polite, made you feel right at home.”

Theo smiles something with half a laugh in it. “Yeah, the clients are sunshine and light.” They ride off to the next one.

When lunch rolls around, Original Cindy’s thigh muscles are hurting bad. She’s in shape, ain’t no part of her anything other than down-ass, but she hasn’t cycled for this long possibly ever. Theo takes her back to Jam Pony, stopping on the way to buy them both sandwiches, and they sit at a free table.

“So tell me about the people here.” She tears off some of her sandwich, unidentified meat not too tough. Could be dog. Might be chicken, from the way it tastes.

Theo points to snippy boss man. “Normal likes to insult everybody here. He’s a good boss, though.” The lanky male Normal had yelled at for being late passes by on his bike, and Theo points at his back. “Sketchy, only started working here a couple months ago, he’s sweet. Herbal, our resident wise man and devout Rasta. Lixy, he can be flaky, but he’s a good friend. Tarah, she’s the funniest person you’re ever likely to meet.”

Original Cindy listens as Theo talks about every person who passes back and forth, until she feels like she knows everybody.

 

_version 2_

The white guy behind her says, “Good. Take this to sector five,” hands her a package.

“Let me show you the ropes,” Herbal says, taking the package out of her hands and leading her away. The room is bustling, people coming and going, nearly everyone with a bike. Herbal sets her up with one and comes with her on the first run; “Normal will get you a sector pass,” he says, and when she asks who Normal is Herbal says, “The boss.”

She comes back from the run to a sector pass and another package. It’s dark when she rides home, and as soon as she gets in she boils water in all the pans she can beg from her neighbours, settles back in the bath, candles flickering. The water cools too quickly and she has to return the pans and she hasn’t eaten yet, but Original Cindy looks at the patterns made by the mold on the ceiling and doesn’t think about anything else.

She’s at Jam Pony three weeks before the run, Herbal riding alongside to deliver a package a few blocks from hers, and Diamond calls out her name from the sidewalk. Original Cindy almost crashes.

“What are you doing here?” she hisses, once she’s out of everyone’s way, hands on her bike and eyes on Diamond and mind in overdrive.

“They let me out. I looked all over for you,” Diamond says, and Original Cindy has to be strong, she has to be.

“Like hell they did.” Belated, she remembers — “Herbal, this is Diamond. My boo.”

“Pleased to make your acquaintance.” Herbal tips his hat to her. Diamond smiles back.

“I’s working with Herbal, delivery.” Original Cindy eyes her. “Tell me something, boo. Is my girl gonna be running out on me again?”

Diamond reaches for her hands, but Original Cindy keeps them close to her body, puts the bike between them. “Not if Original Cindy comes with her,” she says, quiet.

It takes so much of her effort not to drop everything she’s holding in her hands right now and promise she’ll follow Diamond wherever she goes. Original Cindy just shakes her head. “Can’t,” is all she can get out. “You know they’re gonna find you. Then where will Original Cindy be?”

Diamond barely moves; her arms twitch and her lip tucks in and she’s not mad, she just looks — if she cries, Original Cindy is going to walk away as fast as she can. “Diamond’s gonna be back for you, boo.”

“No.” Original Cindy shakes her head again, grip tightening on the handlebars of her bike. She’s suddenly aware that Herbal isn’t standing beside them any more, and wonders where he is. “Baby, I can’t do this no more, I told you that. You gotta be straight-up with me and with the law or Original Cindy’s gonna go elsewhere and find her a new boo.”

Diamond reaches out again. Original Cindy doesn’t move this time. “Don’t do that,” Diamond says, almost a whisper.

Original Cindy swallows. “You better get going,” she says, just as quiet. “They be looking for you. Don’t want no hoverdrone finding my girl.”

Diamond darts in and kisses her, and Original Cindy beats back the urge to cry. “Take care of my boo,” Diamond breathes. Original Cindy doesn’t watch her leave. When she looks up again, Herbal’s standing a few feet away.

They finish up the run. Herbal stays quiet, and Original Cindy is so grateful she sags a little with it. She pays no attention to the route back, following Herbal’s tail light, so when he stops and she looks up, it takes her a second to realise they’re not back at Jam Pony.

“Where we at?” She dismounts, and Herbal beckons; inside is a warehouse, or what used to be one. Broken refridgeraters and abandoned dishwashers lie gutted and piled on top of each other, shoved against the walls and picked apart. A mattress with a stain half the size of itself and springs spilling from a rip is tipped at an angle on one of the mounds of useless white goods, as though it were halted mid-slide. Herbal leads her to a space on the concrete floor, where a circle has been cleared, a single lighter standing in the exact centre. There’s no dust, and a smell lingers.

“I and I welcomes you to the gateway to Zion.” Herbal pulls a half-crushed joint out of his jacket, holding it in one hand and flicking the lighter open with the other. The flame flares for a few seconds, lighting the paper, and Original Cindy watches Herbal take a puff and flip the lighter closed, placing it carefully back in front of them, upright. He offers her the joint.

The ganja hits the back of her throat, and she’s seventeen and it somehow tastes like Diamond and five tears don’t even prickle, they just roll down her cheeks, drip off onto the floor. It makes no sound. She takes another hit, passes it back.

“Jah knows the secrets of your heart, my sister,” Herbal says, managing to both speak and inhale at the same time. “Peace may be found if you look hard enough.”

Original Cindy snorts. “Anything can be found if you look hard enough.”  



End file.
